||*-------- At Tonight's Meeting... ------*||
||*-------- Bozeman Linux User Group Meeting ------*||
||*-------- March 27, 2003 ------*||
||*-------- ------*||
||*-------- Ken Dyke, editor ------*||
||*-------- ------*||
Howdy folks, and welcome to another edition of "At Tonight's Meeting..."
||*-------- At Tonight's Meeting... ------*||
||*-------- by Ken Dyke ------*||
I want to take a moment here to thank Dustin Lee for presenting to
last month's meeting "Python: For Fun and Profit". It was an
excellent presentation. Dustin conveyed his enthusiasm for Python.
This was not an un-informed excitement but is based on his extensive
and varied programming language experience.
For the presentation we had the largest turn out in LUG history.
There were twenty people there for this exciting talk.
||*-------- The Meeting... ------*||
The snow kept most folks at home (or the thought of listening to me
talk for an hour :-) ). Still there were eleven brave souls who
showed up for the second anniversary meeting of the BozemanLUG.
Addison-Wesley sent two copies of of "Firewalls and Internet Security,
Second Edition" by William Cheswick, Steven Bellovin, and Aviel Rubin
to be given away. (see my book review below)
Ken presented "A (not so) Brief History of Linux". This is the topic
that he presented at the first meeting. I am pleased to say that he
did a much better job this time and actually covered the development
of Linux in addition to the history of time-sharing operating
systems and the advent of Unix.
Once Ken sat down a lively discussion broke out that ranged over a
number of topics. Here are a couple of URLs for further reading
related to what was covered in the open discussion period:
The Art of Unix Programming
http://www.catb.org/~esr/writings/taoup/index.html
Linux ethernet bridging
http://bridge.sourceforge.net
ethernet bridge tables
http://ebtables.sourceforge.net
Limits Sought on Wireless Internet Access
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/12/17/technology/17WIRE.html
I have cached a copy of this article on the BozemanLUG website if
you do not want to register with the NYTimes:
http://www.bozemanlug.org/articles/17WIRE.html
||*------ Tool Tip -------*||
||*------ by Ken Dyke -------*||
Here is a simple pipeline for determining the number of files in a
directory:
ls -a | wc -l
The -a option to ls counts the directory itself and its parent.
||*------ PHP News -------*||
||*------ by Ryan Gantt -------*||
::PHP News -- Week of March 27, 2003::
PHP 5.0.0-dev/Zend 2.0-dev updates! (New feature):
http://snaps.php.net - PHP.NET subsidary that provides bi-hourly snapshots
of the newest PHP, Pear releases. Their most popular feature is maybe the
addition of the PHP 5-dev snapshots. These can be downloaded, yet are hardly
as reliable as 4.2.x+.
Some highlight new features include:
//:: Access specifiers for member variables and methods ::\\
public $varPub;
private $varPriv;
protected $varPro;
static $varStat;
//:: Datatype hints for method and function parameters ::\\
public function myMethod( Foo $foo, Bar $bar ){ ... }
Note: Because PHP is not compiled, and only parsed (loosely typed), these
are only type HINTS, they are not necessary for data types such as: int,
double, string, char etc// and should only be used (if at all, they are
optional) for abstract data types.
//:: Exception Handling ::\\
public class Exception
{
public $msg;
function __constrct( $msg )
{
$this->msg = $msg;
}
public function resolve()
{
echo "There was an exception: ".$this->msg;
}
}
try
{
throw new Exception("this is an exception");
}
catch (Exception $error)
{
$error->resolve();
}
Note: This is sweet.
//:: Namespaces ::\\
Namespaces can now be used in PHP to control and create scopes. ex//
namespace Class
{
public class myClass
{
function __construct()
{
echo "Inside namespace::class()";
}
}
}
$thisClass = new Class::myClass();
Of course there is tons more, I mean, this is a full release
But, if I said it all, what would I have left for next month? =]
No pear news this month... Just means more for next month. =D
||*------ Doghouse -------*||
The Bush faction for being playground bullies.
||*----- Book Reviews ------*||
Firewalls and Internet Securtiy, Second Edition
Repelling the Wily Hacker
by William R. Cheswick, Steven M. Bellovin, and Aviel D. Rubin
Addison-Wesley
2003
433 pages
review by Ken Dyke
The first edition appeared in May of 1994. It went on to become a
classic covering real world computer system security. In the years
since then and now the world has experienced the Dot Boom (and the
Dot Bust). This second edition is a major re-write and expansion
over the first.
The book begins by laying out the philosophy and engineering culture
that has emerged for treating system/network security. Taken hand
in hand with the Unix philosophy as described by esr in The Art of
Unix Programming one is then armed with a powerful worldview for
solving problems in a manner that ratches forward.
After laying out this approach to systems design the authors conduct
a protocol by protocol review from a security prospective. There is
a healthy mix of examples taken from the real world to illustrate
the points they wish to make.
While it is much easier reading than the actual RFCs that describe
the protocols themselves it is still technical stuff. I think most
everyone would greatly benefit from reading the philosophy but one
may want to get a little more knowledge about systems and networks
before attempting to make sense of the rest of this book. A good
time might be immmediately after setting up your first LAN.
For the professional this book serves as an excellent review that WILL
find gaps in your knowledge base. If you are responsible for building
or maintaining systems that are exposed to any sort of risk, do
yourself and the organization you are with a favor and read this book.
Consider it a progress test. Remember security is a process to
which there is no final solution.
The Cathedral and the Bazaar:
Musings on Linux and Open Source
Revised Edition
by Eric S. Raymond
O'Reilly
2001
241 pages
review by Ken Dyke
This is a collection of a number of essays written by esr concerning
hacker culture (traditional definition of "hacker") and the open
source development model.
The origins of hacker culture are traced in "A Brief History of Hackerdom".
The various threads that have woven together to become today's FOSS
movement are described.
The Cathedral and the Bazaar describes the dynamics of the open source
development model. Using the author's fetchmail project as a case
study. It was this essay that proposed "given enough eyeballs, all bugs
are shallow".
Homesteading the Noosphere explores the day to day customs as practiced
by members of this culture.
The Magic Cauldron lets some air out of myths regarding software
development. Then proposes nine models for sustainable, stable open
source project development.
esr then looks to the future in The Revenge of the Hackers.
Conclusion: This is not required reading but it does provide a lot
of background on how we got to where we are today and why it matters.
Just for Fun:
The Story of an Accidental Revolutionary
by Linus Torvalds (with David Diamond)
HarperCollins
262 pages
review by Ken Dyke
This was a fun read. It starts out with Linus describing his idea
of the meaning of Life. In the beginning it is about survivial,
then it becomes social, and finally it is just about having fun.
This is an autobiography. Linus describes his childhood as a
geek when geeks were not cool. I found the section describing
how Linux came to be quite interesting. The rest of the book is
biographical.
It is good to see that someone who has had such a huge impact on
computing appears to have a happy family and is living in a
comfortable style (thanks to various Linux-based companies that
showed their gratitude to Linus at the time of their IPOs).
It was a nice break from the usual fare that I read.
||*----- Books Available for Review -----*||
Due to the great response/demand for this feature I have been working
with publishers to increase the selection of books available. I have
succeeded in establishing a couple of relationships for keeping book
reviewers busy. The guidelines given to me by these publishers vary
somewhat but the the following outline encompasses behavior that will
avoid feelings of abuse and exploitation all around.
Please read and follow these guidelines in ordering review copies of
books.
1) Limit one book per month.
2) Publish a review before ordering another book.
3) When selecting a book for review choose one that has been
published within the past year or so.
4) We are a Linux User Group. Please keep this in mind when
selecting titles. (For example, Photoshop does not run on
Linux so it would be inappropriate to ask for "Photoshop 7:
The Complete Reference")
5) If there were a fifth item it would go here.
We have not developed a guide for the review itself so until then you
might give Slashdot's book review guide a look see:
(slashdot.org/book.review.guidelines.shtml)
Send reviews to Ken to be published in the next issue of "At Tonight's
Meeting...". Please make the files ascii text only with lines wrapped
at 75 characters (to fit an 80 character wide screen). Check out the
fmt command. I will use 'fmt -u foo.bar' to format files that do not
fit an 80 character screen. This will likely result in mangling of any
layout you desire. As noted in the Slashdot guideline, do not fear of
making your review too long. You have taken the time to read the book
don't wimp out and write a too short a review that does not tell the rest
of us fully what you think of the book.
The following books are available for review:
www.osborne.com
www.oreilly.com/catalog/prdindex.html
New Riders Press
Addison Wesley
[ken_i_m: If there is a publisher whose books you have enjoyed for
their quality please let me know and I will try to work out an
arrangment with them for obtaining review copies.]
||*----- EOF -----*||